A popular stopover for river cruises, Kizhi island in Karelia is an astonishingly beautiful preserve of some of Russia's best wooden architecture.

Pskov region's three estates associated with Pushkin were more than a quiet place for the poet to create; they also offered material for his muse.

A jewel in the Golden Ring, Rostov Veliky remains little touched by the tumultuous tides of this century's history.

The Stroganov family built a fortune on salt and pelts in Russia's northern town of Solvychegodsk. They also left behind some cultural treasures.

Kargopol is one of the richest settlements in the Russian North. William Brumfield takes us on a visit.

Over 1000 years old, Novgorod was the birthplace of a strain of Russian democracy that was not destined to survive. But its architectural heritage has survived, at least in part.

Soon after coming to power in a bloodless coup, Catherine II (later “The Great”), herself German, extended an invitation to Germans to colonize portions of the lower Volga, to improve farming in the region.

Secreted away in a little-known monastery in Northern Russia are some art treasures of incomparable worth.

When Vladimir fell to the Mongols in 1238, it signaled the beginning of hundreds ofyears of Russian subjugation. But that was just one of the many trials in this town's long history.

Medieval monasteries and a storied past has made a tourist's mecca of Suzdal, one of Russia's oldest, and best-preserved towns.

In the final installment of this tour of towns of the Russian North, William Brumfield takes us to Totma, a former salt-producing center now struggling for an identity.